


Trade Mistakes

by SmileAndASong



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, But it's not really spoilers, Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Character Death, Civil War (Marvel), Depressed Tony Stark, Heavy Angst, I can't tag it enough, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Just following 616 Civil War, Like so much angst, Lucid Dreaming, Making Up, Marvel 616/MCU Crossover, Multiverse, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Spoilers, Tony Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-24
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-10 08:36:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6948025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SmileAndASong/pseuds/SmileAndASong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of the Siberia battle with Steve, Tony has recurring dreams of alternate versions of Steve Rogers and Tony Stark. The alternate versions live a seemingly perfect life together that Tony initially envies. However, his dreams of the pair quickly turn into a nightmare that too closely mirrors his own situation with Steve, though with an even worse ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trade Mistakes

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure if anyone has done this, but I couldn't help myself! 
> 
> Key things about this fic:  
> \- 616 Steve is referred to as Captain America, 616 Tony is referred to as Iron Man. MCU Tony is referred to as Tony, MCU Steve is referred to as Steve.  
> \- 616 characters speak in Italics. MCU characters just speak in quotes.  
> \- There are several direct quotes from Civil War comics (it pained me to re-read those for this fic, you have no idea). Some were altered slightly to be simpler to read/easier for the story.  
> \- Title is inspired by the song Trade Mistakes by Panic! At The Disco.

Every time he closed his eyes, he saw it. Steve raising the shield, stabbing him in the chest and nearly killing him. And then every time he would walk away, leaving him there. Alone. The image burned in his skull and no matter how hard he tried he could not escape it. The pain was there, the wreckage that both of their actions caused was still there. Tony was a futurist - he looked toward the future, he looked toward building it and creating it. So why was he so fixated on the past then? Why was he so incapable of creating a new future?

He had a way of doing it. With the outdated cell phone that currently sat on his desk. And it only came with one contact in it, the only contact that mattered - Steve. And Steve didn't just leave it at the phone, of course not. It came with a letter. A letter from Steve. A letter that contained a pledge, in the true spirit of Captain America. A pledge that if Tony needed it, he would come to help. The implications of what was meant by “if you need me” were slim - was it if he needed him as Captain America, or if he needed him as Steve Rogers, a person he once considered to be a very close and dear friend to him. He wanted to think of the other as that dear friend still, but how could they possibly get to that point when they had nearly killed each other? How then did he rebuild? How then did they move forward to create that future? How did he go about reaching out to him when things were left in such utter ruin? 

Tony’s life had become a nightmare. He lost one of the most important people in his life, lost his entire team, lost his family and his support. The images haunted him when he slept, but they also haunted his consciousness in the day. The nightmare stalked him, gripped him tightly, and would not let him go. He had an out, he had a way to fix it. But here he was, a coward staring at the damn phone.

Tony shoved the phone in the desk drawer, tired of the outdated technology mocking him and tempting him. But he wasn't brave enough to pick it up and make a call. He never was, and he doubted he ever would be. 

It was late and he was seated at his desk, a drink in hand for no good reason at all. Rhodey had gone to sleep, Vision was out of sight. The compound felt empty and hollow. He wasn’t sure why he stayed here. The Avengers were gone, dismantled. It wasn’t even right to call this the Avengers compound anumore. But he couldn’t let it go. He wasn’t sure if he just didn’t want to, or if he was too stubborn to do so.

Tony raised his glass to his lips. “I wonder if he drinks as much as I do…” Tony mused out loud as he stared into the glass of liquid for a moment. Who was he? It technically was not just he, it was the two of them. The two of them were the only thing giving him solace. While his daily life might have been a nightmare, his dreams were uncharacteristically pleasant. The only reason he was having pleasant dreams though was because of them. They were his everything.

Tony Stark had been having strange dreams as of late. For the past two nights, he had been glancing at recurring snippets into the lives of two men. Two men that were identical to him and Steve in every way. Why? Because they were them, technically. Captain America and Iron Man. They were him and Steve in almost every way except one major way. The most important one - they were happy together. Because of that distinguishing factor alone, regardless of the different appearances, regardless of the different friends, regardless of the different experiences - that was the main reason he knew that the Cap and Iron Man in his dreams were not him and Steve. Because they could never have the life that these two had, not with the way things were. Not with the things that they did to each other. 

At least he had them - they helped take away some of his pain. The little snippets of happy Cap and happy Iron Man, together.

He dreamt in snippets, small pieces of the lives of Captain America and Iron Man. It felt like he was looking at a living photo album of key points of the life of another Iron Man. Often times, they were not alone. There were many people with them. Some seemed familiar to him, some were complete strangers. But they were all still superheroes. And they were a team. The Avengers. The Avengers in his dreams were a much larger team than the Avengers that he knew. However, no matter how big or how many Avengers he saw, in every single dream he had there was Captain America and there was Iron Man. Standing united, leading the heroes to defend the world. He saw the Iron Man react to finding Captain America on ice. Iron Man was one of the first people that Captain America saw in the new world. From there, a remarkable friendship for the two of them began. A relationship that was perfect.

He saw countless scenes of Iron Man saving Captain America, even more of Captain America saving Iron Man. Captain America saved him both physically from dangers, and also from himself when he had a bottle in hand. He saw them supporting each other, as friends. He saw them standing together, building a team, creating a family. They were not stabbing each other in the face, they were there for eachother.

He saw how the little things they did together. The celebratory meals they had, the going over tactical plans of attack, the training together. The training snippet was actually his favorite that he saw. On the surface, it didn’t seem like much. Just Captain America and Iron Man sparring each other in a gym. But it was the way that they acted. They were so comfortable, so relaxed with one and other. So at peace, so at home. The words that Cap spoke in that dream continued to haunt him:

_“Mr. Stark, when I woke up in this era, I had no one. Nothing. You gave me a purpose, somewhere to belong… You gave me a home.”_

Iron Man was able to give his Captain America a home, he was able to support him and stand beside him. They created a family - the Avengers were a family to them. Captain America and Iron Man were both apart of that home, that family. His mind immediately linked it to the words in Steve’s letter:

”We all need a family. The Avengers are yours, maybe more so than mine.”

That was one of the parts of Steve’s letter that he fixated on the most. How Steve suggested that the Avengers were not his family, that they were Tony’s. Tony didn’t want that. Tony wanted Steve home, he wanted his family back. He wanted Steve apart of that vision he had for The Avengers - all of them working together and supporting each other, like a family. They once had it, but it was so short and now it was gone. That was why he had fought so hard to keep his family together, to keep Steve within that family. It felt so hard to believe that Steve was once at his side like how the other Captain America was at Iron Man’s side. They had a home. Tony and Steve did not, not anymore.

What Tony wished he could still have.

“I want to see them...I need to see them.” Tony mumbled to himself as he lowered his head onto his desk.

Before the recurring dreams of Cap and Iron Man began, Tony never really wanted to sleep anymore, he usually just passed out. But tonight he needed to sleep. He needed them, he needed to see the snippets of their picture perfect photo album life. 

As he passed out, he wondered if he would see the happy Captain America and Iron Man again. He needed that right now. And even if they were just figments of his imagination, they were a more present alternative to what his reality currently was. He needed to see the Cap and Iron Man that worked as a team, as partners. The Cap and the Iron Man that had a home and a family. He needed that sense of unity. He needed Steve, even if it was just in his dreams.

 

 

As Tony entered the dream state, he at first saw nothing. It was fully black and he couldn’t feel or see anything. However, before a sight came in, there was noise. The noise was indistinguishable to what it was exactly, at first. It was just noise. Tony forced himself to listen in more carefully though. He was able to pinpoint a few key things: loud vibrations, the sound of windows breaking, the roaring of flames, sirens from all over. It sounded like destruction. Suddenly the nothingness faded and he was given full sight to what the sounds were. And he was right. It was destruction. He saw a city, a city that looked like New York. And he saw heroes, so many heroes it was hard to keep track of who was who. Some looked familiar, both from seeing them in his prior dreams or from ones that reminded him of his friends. But they were not fighting an enemy or a common threat. They were fighting each other. 

“Hey!” Tony called out to a man with stretching abilities and a large “4” across his chest. He watched as a red and blue clad hero kicked him in the face. Spider-Man? “Stop that! All of this. Don’t you see you’re destroying the city, people are in danger!” Tony called out to the two of them but they didn’t even look at him. They just kept on fighting each other. All of the heroes just kept fighting. The city was burning, civilians were running in terror. And they all just kept fighting. The familiarity of it all caused something to tighten in Tony’s chest. Why was he seeing this? This happened to him in real life too, he didn’t need to be dreaming about it. A thought crossed his mind and panic set in.

“Please don’t let them be fighting…” Tony hoped desperately, but another voice broke through that thought.

_“You and me, Cap! Just like the last time!”_

The focus changed and the two of them appeared. Captain America and Iron Man. There they were, punching at each other. The sight was all too familiar, even more painful than just seeing the other heroes fighting. The image would not change though, it kept on playing. Why did he have to be tortured like this? The Captain America and Iron Man here were not directly Steve and himself - he didn’t know who they were. But it didn’t take much to figure out what they were likely fighting about. Or just the fact that they were fighting at all. 

“No...this isn’t right. They’re not supposed to be fighting each other. Iron Man...he gave Cap a home! Cap said so!” Tony cried out as he watched a scene that looked so painstakingly familiar. How could this happen to them? Why did they have to go down the same path that he and Steve did. 

“STOP IT!” Tony cried out as he ran closer toward the two of them. He foolishly reached out to grab Cap’s shoulder and pull him back, but his hand just went right through Captain America. Tony could not alter this dream. He was not a part of it, he was just a bystander...the scene was destined to play out without his interference. That didn’t stop him from speaking his mind though, even if they would not hear him.

“This isn’t supposed to happen to the two of you also, please…” Tony begged, but his efforts were fruitless. The fight raged on.

Iron Man fell down and Captain America used it as an opening to gain the upper-hand. Captain America bore his shield over and over into Iron Man’s face plate. He hit so hard with it that it eventually tore away, exposing a broken face. Tony did not see his own face when Steve had been stabbing him, but he hoped it did not look near as pained as the other Iron Man's. Other Iron Man looked so broken - not necessarily from the physical pain, but from the pain of just /who/ was causing him that pain.

His beloved.

_”What are you waiting for Steve? Finish it.”_

Captain America raised his shield once more, but civilians came out of nowhere to stop him and protect Iron Man. Tony watched as Captain America tried to convince them that he was doing this for them, but then he watched as Cap's expression changed to one of complete shock. He watched as Captain America looked around at all of the damage that he caused, that all of them caused. 

_”What have we done?”_

Tony heard Captain America speak. He watched as the other walked right past him and looked to the destruction that he and his fellow heroes caused. Tony saw the look on his face, it was one of utter regret and sorrow. Not for himself or for Iron Man, or for the other superheroes. It was for the people, the civilians. The people they were supposed to be looking out for. They had failed them. There were tears, big fat tears that were rushing down his face. Tony watched as he reached up and removed that mask to expose himself and his face for all to see. Captain America was presenting himself as a person, without a mask. A person who was the same as his people, and not above them. 

_”Cap, what are you doing? We were beating them.”_ Tony looked to the direction of that voice and saw someone who looked an awful lot like Falcon speaking. Other heroes were agreeing with Falcon’s words, but Captain America was not even addressing them. He dropped his mask and his shield to the ground.

_”Stand down troops. That’s an order.”_

With those words, Captain America surrendered. He was arrested and escorted off the scene. Arrested? Captain America wasn’t supposed to be arrested, this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. The other heroes just stood for a moment as the police escorted Captain America, just watching more so in shock - both in the realization of why Captain America surrendered, and the way that their own actions had led him to do so.

Then there was Iron Man. Tony turned back to his doppleganger. Iron Man was on the ground, still beaten and still down. Because the mask was removed, Tony could see the tears in Iron Man’s eyes. They were the same one’s as Captain America’s. Captain America’s tears were voluntarily exposed for all to see in his surrender. Though his face was exposed like Captain America’s had been, but his mask was not removed voluntarily. It was taken off by force. That was the Tony Stark way it seemed. To shadow all emotions, until it came to the point where he was forced to expose them. It was apparent to Tony that the other was crying over Captain America, that he was regretting his actions during all of this. But he just stayed there. He did nothing, made no effort to fix it, no effort to try and stop Captain America from being taken away.

“Why don’t you do something? Why don’t you save him? How could you let this happen!?” Tony asked the other, his fists clenching in frustration. His own instinct was to blame himself, the other version of himself. Not Cap. Perhaps that was the manifestation of his own guilt and his frustration with himself for not doing anything to fix things. Because really, who was he to judge this Iron Man? What efforts had he made to try and reach out to his own Steve? Everything turned black once more and the silence came back, but Tony’s thoughts and emotions on what he just witnessed still ran thick.

 

 

_”I begged you to stop.”_

As the voice spoke, a new scene was set before Tony. Tony found himself in what appeared to be a prison. It didn’t seem like a typical prison that was holding several inmates though, it seemed like one that was sort of just put together out of convenience. He looked around for a moment before he followed the sound of the voices. There they were.

If Tony had to guess, it was the aftermath of the fight that he just saw and the surrender of Captain America. Tony watched as Captain America looked up at Iron Man and scoffed. Tony moved closer to Iron Man to get a good look at Captain America in the cell. He seemed tired. Not just tired from a lack of sleep, but tired from everything. Tony could relate to that feeling.

It was hard seeing Captain America in a jail cell. It had been hard seeing all of his friends in the cell, but something about seeing Cap, the symbol of freedom and justice felt even harder. Especially when he, or Iron Man in this case, could have done something to stop it from happening.

He could not see Iron Man’s expression due to the faceplate being down. He remembered those tears that he saw on the other’s face in the New York street. Perhaps that was why the mask was up as he met with Captain America - perhaps Iron Man was still crying underneath the mask.

_”Do you think the fact that I’m in here is because you won, Tony?”  
“Uh, yes?”_

“Won? How the hell can you be concerned about winning? What did you even win? Is it worth it to have lost your friend? Did you really come here just to gloat!?” Tony yelled out loud, but the scene played on without him. 

Winning. What was there to win here? He didn’t know the details of what this Cap and Iron Man were fighting over, but whatever it was, it brought them to this point. Captain America behind bars, the two of them separated. Did Iron Man really come just to gloat at Captain America through the jail cell? No, he was supposed to be helping him!

_”Look at Stark - King of the World! I want to know! I want to know what the hell made you think this was your job to do - Who made you the moral compass of us all, Tony? How could you lay down with the people you laid down with? How could you do what you’ve done!? Tell me, Director Stark - was it worth it?”_

Tony watched as Captain America yelled out his emotions at Iron Man, only for Iron Man to sit there in silence. The unreadable mask told nothing. Captain America’s question stuck with him though - “Was it worth it?”

He wasn’t sure of the details for this Captain America and Iron Man. He wasn’t fully sure why they were fighting. But even then, Tony knew that it wasn’t worth it. He saw Iron Man crying, he saw Captain America crying. They were crying over what they did to not only each other, but to the whole world. Tony wanted desperately to hear Iron Man say what Captain America needed to hear: “No Steve, it wasn’t worth it”. He wanted to hear that so desperately. He wanted Iron Man to do what he himself had been so afraid of, reconcile with Captain America - rebuild the future together. But he just stood there in silence, unreadable and seemingly invulnerable through that mask. The invincible Iron Man. Never let them in, never let them see a thing.

_”Well...you’re a sore loser, Captain America.”_

With that, Iron Man walked away. Tony watched as Captain America looked down in his cell. He seemed disappointed in Iron Man and his answer. Tony was extremely disappointed in Iron Man and his answer. 

“Hey! Hey, asshole come back!” Tony cried out. “You’re a liar! I saw you crying, I saw you laying there and crying over him! You can’t hide behind that mask forever! You know it wasn’t worth it, because I saw you!” 

But once again, no one reacted to his voice. Tony watched as Iron Man walked away without even so much of a glance toward Captain America in the cell. Tony pressed up to the bars and looked at Captain America in the cell.

“Cap, it wasn’t worth it. It really wasn’t worth it. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry...if I could take it all back, I would. Please...we have to stand together again, we have to be a team! I need you, Cap!” Tony cried out to the Captain America that was not even the Cap he knew. But Captain America’s head stayed down and stayed focused on his lap. The scene once again fell black, and Tony felt cold from what he just saw. He wasn’t sure why he was trying to apologize to Captain America. This wasn’t his Captain America. He was apologizing for actions that he didn’t do - they were the actions of the other Iron Man. But saying the words. Saying them out loud, even if it wasn’t to the right Cap in the right time, it felt necessary to say. Especially after he watched how that Iron Man just walked away so callously from the other.

How could he do that? How was that man supposed to be him, and then leaving his friend behind? Tony was nothing like him, he would never turn his back on Steve Rogers like that. But...what had he done so far? He fought the other, he didn’t help him break the others out of jail, he made no effort to reach out to the other, he hadn’t even said a word to him. Steve had sent him a letter and the phone, offered him help if necessary. And Tony? He did nothing. He had sat around and felt sorry for himself, and fixated on living vicariously through another Iron Man of his recurring dreams. He scolded Iron Man in his dream for letting Captain America down, yet he was doing the same. Who was he to judge? He was no better.

 

 

Suddenly a voice came through, but the scene did not reset with any visuals.

_”The worst thing has happened. The thing I can’t live with has happened. And for all of our back and forth, and all the things we’ve done and said to each other...for all the hard questions I’ve had to ask, and the terrible lies I’ve had to tell. There’s one thing that I’ll never be able to tell anyone now. Not my friends or my co-workers or my president. The one thing! The one thing I should have told you…_

Tony recognized that voice after a moment. It was Iron Man’s. Iron Man’s voice was similar to his own, but different enough to be unique. The tone sounded especially different now. It was a complete turnaround from the callous confidence from the jail cell encounter. Despite not being able to see him, he could hear it - the desperation, the pleading, the guilt, all of it was manifesting in his words. The words that he should have said in the last scene that Tony saw. What did this mean? Did it mean that the Iron Man and Captain America here were finally going to reconcile? Finally going to rebuild toward the future that they deserved together? Would they finally return to all of the happy scenes he had seen in the prior nights? To the home that the had together?

_”It wasn’t worth it…”_

The darkness faded and a blinding light replaced it. As the light faded, the scene became clear. His eyes first fell on Iron Man, mask off in full armor and sobbing hysterically. Tony’s expression was confused at first, before his eyes panned over to what was in front of Iron Man. He practically fell over at what he saw.

Captain America, lying on the table. A bloody shield across his body, uniform torn, a lifeless expression on his beaten face. Captain America was died. Tony was looking at the /corpse/ of Captain America. Tony was looking at Iron Man, himself for the most part, looking at the corpse of Captain America. Steve Rogers. The words...the words that should have been said earlier, that could have rebuilt so much. Now they were gone, now the two of them were at the point of no return. There was no reconciling. There was no prospect of help or hope. There were no outdated cell phones, or hand-written notes and promises. The Captain America and Iron Man before him were done. There was no coming back from this, no coming back from death. Tony thought that things could not get worse for him and Steve - evidently, it could.

“You idiot!” Tony cried out as he looked at Iron Man who just sat there crying. “You should have told him this earlier! You could have saved him, you could have saved everybody! You could have brought all of your friends together again, you could have been there for the entire world again. You could have stood by his side and fought with him for years to come! But now you can’t because he’s dead! He’s dead and it’s all your fault!” Tony screamed as he moved toward the body of Captain America and got a closer look, even though it pained him to see. He cried, he sobbed. Him and Iron Man were both sobbing over Captain America. Tony was not only sobbing over the dead Captain America before him, but also the Captain America that he knew in his own life. The Captain America that was once his childhood hero, the man that became his teammate, the man that became his friend, the man that he had fallen in love with, the man that he had almost lost entirely.

What if his life played out like this Iron Man’s? What if Steve died because of him?

“You gave him a home! You were his family, his fucking family! You loved him, he needed you! And you let him down because you couldn’t put your damn pride aside!” Tony cried out. The home and the family that he had previously envied Captain America and Iron Man for having. It was gone, it was destroyed. And in the worst possible way too.

“No!” Tony said out loud in response to the thoughts that were suddenly pouring through his mind. “I won’t let that happen. I won’t let any of this happen or come true for me. I am not you! I am not going to make the same mistakes that you did! I am not going to walk away from him when he needs me the most, I am not going to turn my back on him again. You know why? Because it wasn’t worth it! None of this is worth it! The Accords, the fighting, Rhodey never being able to walk on his own again, losing my family, losing Steve! It wasn’t fucking worth it! ”

Tony threw his body across the shield and he sobbed. His eyes shut and he could hear nothing but his own sobbing. He couldn’t feel anything as he laid across the shield, but he knew the lifeless body was underneath him. His own sobbing was so loud that he couldn’t hear the other Iron Man’s after a while. His eyes were closed so he also did not realize that the scene had once again turned dark.

 

 

After a moment, Tony opened his eyes to find what at first he thought was a new scene. As he looked around and recalled his surroundings though, he realized the dream was done. He was awake and out of the dream. He was back home and at his office desk, where he allegedly passed out among his copy of the Sokovia Accords. His mind thought back to the dream that he just had. Was that a dream? It all felt so vivid, like he was really there in the midst of all of the different scenes. Was it just heightened because he had passed out drunk? Either way, the realness of it all was enough to stick with him. Before his latest dream, Tony couldn’t get the image of Steve stabbing him in the chest out of his mind. But now that image had been replaced by a new one that Tony was fixating on, one far more horrifying: The image of a dead Captain America was ingrained in his head. Was he destined to be forever haunted by horrifying images of how he hurt Captain America? He could not get it out no matter how hard he tried.

Unless.

Tony looked over to the desk drawer. He opened it and saw it - the phone. He picked it up and gripped it tightly in his hand. The only way to fix this, the pain he was experiencing both from the ‘dreams’ and his own life was with words. If he learned anything from the other Iron Man, it was that holding back feelings might be the Tony Stark way by nature, but that did not mean that it was going to come without consequences. Iron Man might be invincible, but Tony Stark was still a man. 

Tony had been waiting around for long enough. It was time to confront. It was time to take all of the mistakes he made, all of the mistakes the other Iron Man made, and trade them for the happiness that they deserved. He should have traded his mistakes a long time ago. The other Iron Man didn’t and he had to pay the ultimate price for that.

Now was the time. It was time to rebuild.

He pressed the dial button for the only contact on the phone. He had no idea where Steve was in the world or what time it was by him. Tony didn’t even know what time it was for him. But it couldn’t wait, he had waited long enough. Tony had mused over what his first words would be to Steve if he were to call him. He considered many different options, but only one phrase needed to be said.

“Tony?” Steve’s voice was welcoming. He was hearing it for the first time in weeks, and not just in a recorded video from TV reports or from replaying it in his memory. He felt a chill overtake his body. Tony was quiet for a moment, his grip tightening on the phone. All of his mistakes, all of his actions, all of the other Iron Man’s mistakes, they all culminated in his mind at once. Mere seconds had passed but it felt like an eternity. It was time. Time to trade those mistakes every Tony made for the words that should have been said to every Steve. Across any universe, in any reality, they were the words that demanded to be heard. The phrase that could have saved a life. The words that were going to help bring back his family, his home. His Steve.

“It wasn’t worth it.”


End file.
